TO AN OAK.
IT was a cruel hand that tore
From thee, so helpless now and hoar,
That misleto, the only one
Left on our oaks: how many a sun
Its ripe and rounded pearls hath seen,
And leaves, when yours had fallen, green
Where all assert an ancient stem
Had pity hold on none of them?
And did no Druid reappear
To cry in threatening tone “forbear!
Blind idiots! is there none to trace
That misleto’s more noble race?
None who can sing in Celtic rhyme
The glories of its parents’ prime?
How (bards behind) we Druids stood
In the dim center of the wood,
With golden blade, in vest of snow,
To clip our sacred misleto?
And dare ye, recreants, so efface
Here the last scion of his race.”